Birthdays

[rayilynlee <rayilynlee@xxxxxxx>]

A resident of St. George, Utah has some interesting ideas, especially
whether spirits divide when embryo divides for twinning:

"My birth date is only proof of when my life began

A letter writer said science has determined that "an embryo is a human
life." Let's consider that statement and its implications.
What is "human life?" Most Christians call it a "living soul," a body
combined with a spirit. Since science cannot prove that spirits even exist
(they cannot be seen, weighed, or otherwise observed), science cannot say
when one enters a fertilized egg. That is entirely a religious issue.
Unfortunately, scripture does not define when it takes place. Some believe
it occurs at conception, others say it's when the fetus begins to move,
others say at birth. My church says that God has not revealed when the
spirit enters the body, but we reverence the entire life-creating process,
beginning with the marriage of a man and a woman.
Faced with the absence of scientific facts or religious consensus regarding
the moment when human life begins, what does our legal system say? Western
society has historically assumed that life begins at some undefined point
after conception. William Blackstone's "Commentaries on the Laws of
England," an 18th century study of the common law (often cited by our
Supreme Court justices) says that "life begins [legally] as soon as an
infant is able to stir in its mother's womb." But that also is a very
subjective standard.
Recently, those who believe that the spirit enters at conception have used
politicians to impose their personal religious belief. South Dakota passed a
contested law that orders doctors to tell women seeking abortions that
"human life begins when a human ovum is fertilized by a human sperm." In
other states, judges have labeled the intentional death of a fertilized ovum
as "murder." By that standard, the birth control pills used by millions of
women today would be "murder," since they prevent the implantation of a
fertilized ovum on the uterine wall.
The "human life" debate raises interesting questions. For example, if the
spirit enters at conception, does that spirit divide itself when an embryo
divides into identical twins? If not, when does the second spirit enter? And
what about the hundreds of thousands of frozen embryos stored in fertility
clinics by couples hoping to have children. Do frozen embryos contain frozen
spirits? Since 99 percent of them will never be implanted, who should pay
for their continued storage when their owners die or abandon them? Is it
respectful to keep them in a freezer until they're eligible for Social
Security?
And there are less speculative but more critical questions. If one of your
family members was raped or was carrying a badly deformed fetus that posed a
significant health risk to the mother, should your options be limited by the
religious beliefs of others? My church opposes abortion but it allows for
some limited exceptions that South Dakota's law might prohibit.
Also, without scientific data or religious consensus on when spirits enter
embryos, there is no social standard by which to prohibit use of embryos in
carefully controlled stem cell research projects seeking cures for serious
medical problems. Personal religious belief should not be imposed on society
in the absence of a consensus on the underlying issues.
Let's not return to the fanaticism of colonial Massachusetts when one group
of Christians drove out other Christians who wouldn't conform to their
beliefs. Remember, the Constitution prohibits the "establishment of
religion." I hope we won't create laws that attempt to define when my spirit
entered my body. My birth date is an adequate legal statement of when my
human life began".
Raymond Kuehne is a resident of St. George.
Originally published July 3, 2006

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